The Effects of Formative Assessment on Student Achievement and Attitudes in Math

The objective of formative assessment is to allocate or assign a value to the student, identify the student’s learning deficiencies and make instructional arrangements to eliminate these deficiencies. This study employed a non-equivalent group pre-test and post-test design to investigate the effects of formative assessment on fifth-grade students’ academic achievement and their attitudes toward mathematics. The independent variables were formative assessment and level-determining evaluation methods. The dependent variables were students’ academic achievements and attitudes toward mathematics. The research group comprised fifth-grade students of a determined secondary school in the Pasinler district of Erzurum province. Through random assignment, 17 students were included in the experimental group and 13 in the control group. The data were obtained using the achievement test and attitude scale. This research was conducted in a secondary school fifth-grade math class for 11 weeks. The mathematics teacher, the researcher, delivered lessons to both groups. The mathematics achievement of students in the experimental group was higher than the control group. However, the difference was not statistically significant. Similarly, no significant difference was found in the attitudes of students toward math. Various recommendations were made in light of the findings obtained in this study.